SPANISH PARLIAMENT

Evening Star, Issue 22460, 3 October 1936, Page 17

SPANISH PARLIAMENT

OPTIMISTIC REGARDING FUTURE REBELS' RING OF STEEL DEFIED 1 NEW ZEALAND AIRMAN WOUNDED Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright MADRID, October 1. The Spanish Parliament met in the capital, with the rebels’ ring of steel only 20 miles away. Speakers hurled defiance at the rebels, expressing optimism regarding the future. Senor Barrao, tlie President, said: “ Spain prefers to die on her feet rather than to live on her knees.” The Premier, Senor Caballero, said: “ Wo declare before Parliament and the world our profound conviction that victory will lie with Spain as represented by this House. We will fight to the last moment while there is a square yard of soil to defend.” A New Zealand airman, Eric Griffiths, who was wounded in fighting against rebel planes, is recovering from his wound in a Madrid hospital. BRITISH EX-MAYOR’S VISIT TAKES PART IN FIGHTING. LONDON, October 2. Alderman Dobbie, ex-Mayor of York and ex-president of the Railwaymen’s Union, in a speech in London, revealed that while he was on a visit to Spain he joined a Government machine gun crew at Toledo and took a share in the work. If thq Government had had heavy artillery and high explosives the alcazar could not have lasted two hours, he said. ALLEGED ATROCITIES CHARGE AND COUNTER-CHARGE. LONDON, October 2. (Received October 3, at 1.30 a.m.) Charge and counter-charge of atrocities in Spain appear almost daily, but are generally accepted with some reserve. Two documents with an official flavour were issued to-day. The College of Lawyers at Madrid is circulating throughout the world a document declaring that the rebels massacred 9,000 people at Seville, 2,000 at Saragossa, and 1.500 at Badajoz, where they were hegfled in the bullring and mown down with machine guns, the wounded being left lingering among the dead. The Geneva delegates have received from rebel headquarters at Burgos a list of horrors attributed to Government; troops in every city captured in Southern Spain, including 91 slain at Axes Biiena, 23 being burned alive at Araha prison, and tjje shooting of Colonel Luiz Pinzon, a descendant of Columbus, in the presence of bis two sisters, whp went mad. GENERAL FRANCO’S DECLARATION LISBON, October 2. (Received October 3, at 11 a.m.) General Franco, interviewed, said: “ We aim to establish a regime favouring the workers and middle class. Every home must have bread. Those possessing too much must share it.”